


Prose Before—

by Draskireis



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, Nursey's Birthday, Soft Boys, acts of service and other demonstrations of affection, baking as an assertion of love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-26
Updated: 2020-02-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:47:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22904212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Draskireis/pseuds/Draskireis
Summary: It's Nursey's birthday, so Dex is baking.
Relationships: Chris "Chowder" Chow & Derek "Nursey" Nurse & William "Dex" Poindexter, Derek "Nursey" Nurse & William "Dex" Poindexter, Derek "Nursey" Nurse/William "Dex" Poindexter, Tony "Tango" Tangredi/Connor "Whiskey" Whisk/OMC
Comments: 10
Kudos: 101





	Prose Before—

Dex was using the Jack Zimmermann Memorial Laundry Machines in the small part of the Haus basement into which his bungalow had not expanded—he’d framed out another space as a sitting room of sorts over the summer and set it up so the light from the only window he hadn’t claimed in the initial construction shone directly onto Nursey’s chair. 

Dex might have shoved a concave mirror in behind the window well when he’d replaced the old ones. 

He’d put the bathroom in the week before everyone got back to school for preseason. He’d scheduled his summer job—in Boston this year, not SF—to end a week before everyone got back so he could work on the Haus. His uncle Jim had come down to visit, and ended up helping Dex redo a bit of the plumbing so he could also build himself his own bathroom in the basement. 

The bathroom was small—just a toilet, a stall shower, and a sink in between them, all awkwardly organized in a corner of the basement near the pipes. Nursey had insisted on a seat in the shower, and nice tile. Then he’d had _opinions_ on the tile, at which point he decided to pay for it all, too. Which was nice of him, Dex grudgingly admitted.

It’d probably be an hour, Dex figured, before Nursey got back from office hours for one of the classes he TAed. He was pretty sure that today it was freshman comp, but there was a small chance it was the intro poetry seminar. No time to dawdle. He finished shoving clothes into the dryer, turned it on, and hustled upstairs.

When Dex strode into the kitchen, Tango offered him a crisp, ironic salute from where he sat at the table with Nik’s feet in his lap. The wrestler was reading his psych book, and Tango looked like he was editing a paper. Nik didn’t look up from the book, but waved vaguely in Dex’s direction.

‘Thanks for chopping the rhubarb, Tango.’

‘Happy to help! I shaved down the good chocolate, too, and only stole a little bit. When’s Nursey gonna be back?’

‘An hour or so?’ As they talked, Dex was assembling what he needed—a mixing bowl, eggs, flour, chocolate, a small pot to make the rhubarb filling in, and the deep muffin tin that Bitty had left behind due to having better in Providence. ‘About enough time for me to get through this recipe. Not gonna lie, kinda glad he’s declared he doesn’t want a princess cake this year.’ He put the water on to boil.

Nik, at last, looked up. ‘Gone full queen, then?’

Tango poked him in the knee. The microwave beeped—chocolate was melty. Chowder wandered into the kitchen at the smell, and sidled closer to Dex.

‘Less competition for that role this year—although Landmann would drunkenly fight him for the title.’

‘But would he win, though?’

‘Well, no. Wouldn’t stop him though. Be funny to watch, too.’ Dex started mixing the wet ingredients together before adding them to the dry ones, just like his Ma had taught him.

‘Just cuz he’s skinny and fights about as well as Shitty ever did, Chowder, doesn’t mean you can—actually, no. That’s about enough reason to make fun of him.’

Dex moved the mixing bowl out of reach of Chowder’s spoon without sparing his friend a glance. When Chowder tried a different angle, he got the warning version of a hip check.

‘Remember, o fearless goalie, we mere mortals do not get birthday-slash-valentine’s-day cupcakes.’

‘Cuz Dex doesn’t share well,’ Chowder grumped. ‘No, that’s a lie. Sorry, Dex.’

‘You’ll each get one, but I need to make sure the measurements are all set so I know if my tweaks from last time are right. I also delegate to Chowder the right to auction off the other three. You guys can’t bid, though—you’ll have already gotten one.’

Dex saw Tango open his mouth in the reflection of the kitchen window.

‘And neither you nor Chowder can submit vicarious bids for your significant others unless they actually want the cupcake themselves.’ He poured the batter into the muffin tins, and then into the oven for the first stage.

‘I will give you an accounting of the proceeds when you return from wherever Nursey drags you off to. Fortunately, Cait, unlike Whiskey, is a fiend for chocolate almost on the order of you.’

‘Rigging the auction already, Chowder?’

‘Maaaaaaybe.’

‘Could I get you to wrap some of the pie weights in tin foil—twelve little packets of ‘em, like six weights each. If you’re gonna bribe your way into Farmer’s good grace?’

‘Bribe? Her affection is not _bought_ .’ Chowder, already getting out the tinfoil, faked outrage poorly. ‘There is no mere commerce. That cupcake will be an **offering** to the glory that is my girlfriend. Plus, I’m not out of her good graces.’

Dex dropped the rhubarb into the boiling water and measured spices into the other mixing bowl he’d gotten out. Also sugar. Chowder finished the last packet of weights and ruffled Dex’s hair before leaving the kitchen. Dex had forgotten what he and Farmer had planned. A movie, maybe?

A timer beeped, and Dex pulled the half-baked muffins out of the oven to deposit pie-weight packets onto the center of each of them. Back into the oven with them. He dumped the rhubarb into a colander more frequently used for spaghetti, then flipped it into the empty sauce pan and poured the sugar and spices—mostly ginger, a bit of paprika—on top. Started mashing it all together.

* * *

Across campus, Derek was not having the most stellar of birthdays. Team breakfast had been nice and celebratory, and classes had been alright, and the birthday celebrations during practice had been good. But he’d slipped on an icy patch on the way to the writing center, spilled coffee on his favorite shirt, hadn’t had time to change out of it, since most of his laundry needed doing—and was in the bungalow. Then some passing student had snarked about the vaunted grace of the hockey team. Derek was pretty sure she was a library worker and therefore automatically hated SMH as an undifferentiated whole, but… still.

And Chowder hadn’t responded to his admittedly whining texts. Probably getting ready for his aquarium date with Farmer. Dex, he knew, was busy. Didn’t know with what, but he’d apologized to Nursey in advance that morning in the bungalow and said he’d find him after his office hours. That were now over.

Derek trudged from Leighton to Faber to change his shirt. He kept a spare button-down in his cubby, and would probably have at least a little funk to it, but it’d be better than wearing a lukewarm latte stain.

Someone was skating—figure skating—in Faber. To what sounded like it might be an anime soundtrack. Some waltz with lots of piano and someone singing in what he was pretty sure was Japanese. The blades sounded different on the ice, although it was probably a matter of fewer skaters, more precision edgework, and the occasional jump. Derek didn’t watch long—he needed his shirt.

There was a card taped to his cubby. Carnation pink envelope with a Hello Kitty card inside that declared ‘There’s no one more adorable than you.’ Dex had carefully and neatly written out a message that Derek would read later when he wasn’t in the middle of a locker room.

Derek was in luck: he’d forgotten that he’d changed out his backup shirt recently, cuz he’d needed one after their last home game. Hops had done something unspeakable to the one he’d planned to wear, and had opted to skate suicides instead of paying the fine. Nursey shoved the stained shirt in an empty pocket of his book bag. He was certain Dex would know how to get the stain out, would probably grumble adorably and insist that Derek wouldn’t do it right, would then make absolutely sure that the stain was gone.

Cuz he was the best.

From Faber, Derek picked his very careful way across the frigid open spaces to the library. The paths were fairly well shoveled, but he didn’t want a repeat of earlier, particularly when he didn’t have a second back-up shirt stashed anywhere outside the Haus. He’d told Dex he wouldn’t be back for a while and that it might be better for Dex to come find him.

That he’d neglected to tell his boyfriend where he’d end up was beside the point.

Spending his birthday—spending Valentine’s Day—studying was less than ideal. He was feeling introverted and done with people, though, after practice and classes and TAing—to say nothing of publicly wiping out and drenching himself in coffee, so it might work out for the best to have to hang out away from the Haus.

Derek’s pocket buzzed.

 **Jaws:** If you’re not home soon, I’m not gonna see you before we head out to the aquarium! [four crying emoji]

 **Me:** Yeah, but we had lunch together.

 **Jaws:** It was Wednesday. We do that /every/ Wednesday!

 **Me:** Yeah, but they had chocolate cake today. Not as good as Dex’s, but pretty serviceable for dining hall food. Plus, you gave me birthday hugs.

 **Jaws:** And those are different from normal hugs?

 **Me:** Chyeah—cuz it’s my birthday. Anyway, I’m off to the library to work on the current chapter of my capstone. Have fun on your date and wish me luck in bibliography hell.

 **Jaws:** Should I let Dex know you’re cooped up in the library? He’s baking and being protective of it. He’s letting me auction off the extras, though. Also, you love bibliographies. Don’t lie.

 **Me:** That’s proof he loves you, bro. 

**Jaws:** I *know*!

 **Me:** Also, still fake about the biblios. Well, no, I love books. But.

 **Me:** Anyway, have fun with Cait—say hi for me.

 **Jaws:** I will do both of these things ::sage nod::

Derek pocketed his phone and stalked down the central staircase from the entry to one of the less social floors with better seats for studying and napping. He wasn’t sure whether to plan on the one or the other. Just to be safe, he snagged a table underneath the stairs—the one with the ratty old couch that might have been the Haus couch’s nerdier counterpart.

He set up his laptop, along with a water bottle—the metal-because-it’s-shatterproof-Nurse one that Dex had gotten him for his birthday the year before in an uncharacteristic splurge—and an energy bar he’d snagged before leaving. As he pulled it out, he saw that Dex had snuck a card into his bag that he’d missed. Very middle school valentine—a bit generic compared to the Hello Kitty. Just some cute guy making a weird pun that seemed like a reference but wasn’t coming directly to Derek’s mind.

At some point in writing this damn thing, Derek had learned that acrobat has a maximum number of documents one could open. So now he had to take all those .pdfed articles and reduce them to a bibliography. It was _way_ worse than Lardo’s had been, because there were poems, there were articles on the poems, there were internet sources, and two legal opinions.

Whoever invented legal citation schemes was an asshole. Seriously. He’d ask Shitty to check it later, maybe.

Work progressed, and time passed, and at some point, Derek lost track of both.

* * *

Chowder had left for his date, and Nursey was nowhere to be found. Instead of properly auctioning off the extra cupcakes, he’d wrapped one up for Caitlin, taken one for himself, and tried to mash the last of them into Dex’s face. Ford had laughed until she’d realized that there wouldn’t be one left for her enjoyment. Because a competition between goalie focus versus managerial disgruntlement was _not_ how the night was supposed to go, Dex had snatched the cupcake from Chowder and surrendered it to Ford.

That had been an hour ago. Whiskey had come and retrieved his boys, and they’d all vanished off to some unspecified location. Dex didn’t pry—he’d hear about it from Tango later anyway, and not prying had led to Whiskey actually hanging out with the team sometimes. Ford had briefly appeared in the kitchen to say hi to Dex again (and steal some of the good chocolate) before retreating to her personal anti-Valentine’s party in Bitty’s old room, which she’d gotten in an unprecedented dibs-forward from Whiskey.

He’d texted Nursey, who had not responded. He’d had his office hours today, and Dex knew he was sometimes antisocial after, depending on how it had gone. He also had a major deadline coming up on his capstone—a preliminary bibliography. Which, naturally, he was seriously stressed about and had also gone kinda overboard on the research.

Nursey denied that these things were related.

All signs therefore pointed toward the library. Dex decided four was a good, safe number of birthday cupcakes to take with him—that being how many fit in the smallest of Bitty’s discarded cupcake carriers (he’d always pretended they were for mini-pies, but that was not how they were sold). That left two for the counter. For his amusement, he set steak knives beside each of them as it to suggest the cupcakes would be a prize from a duel. There was only a slight chance that anyone would die before he got back.

Once the baked goods were secure, Dex assembled his own work—no need to interrupt Nursey’s just to deliver food. Mostly that meant packing up his laptop and a couple textbooks. He got his coat on over his flannel, slung his bag over his shoulder, grabbed the cupcake holder, and set out.

It was cold out, and still early enough that there were couples wandering around. Dex kept to the less-traveled paths out of habit, avoiding the street lights and looking up at the stars. The library still had a few hours before it closed when Dex got there. Nursey still hadn’t texted back—he was either ears-deep in work or had fallen asleep. Dex’s money, such as it weren’t, was on the second of those. That meant comfy seats.

Ten minutes later, Dex was about to give up on the hunt. He walked back to the stairs, only to see Nursey with his head down on a book. It was hopelessly adorable, so he took a picture. He’d text it to Chowder later. Then he set up shop beside Nursey. He opened the sealed container and set it between himself and Nursey, who was not yet drooling on his books. He was wearing a different shirt than he’d left the Haus in.

Huh.

While Dex took no particular pains to be quiet about his setting up, neither was he intentionally louder than necessary. Just the zipper noises of his bag and his laptop sleeve followed by the clicks of setting the computer down on the wooden table and of the keys as he entered his password and of the trackpad as he opened up programs. Some combination of Dex’s presence, the smells of still-pretty-fresh baked goods, and the quiet typing away—interspersed with muffled bouts of cursing when a program was not cooperating—brought Nursey back to consciousness after about ten minutes.

‘Mmmm. You brought me food?’ Nursey’s voice was muzzy with sleep.

‘Happy birthday, Derek.’

‘Thanks, babe. Happier now that you’re here.

‘Sap.’

‘You love it.’

Dex grinned and leaned in to snag a kiss.

‘Yup. This is what I’ve been looking forward to all day.’

‘Then why were you avoiding the Haus?’

‘Cuz I had work to do. And office hours. You know what I always say: prose before— _mmf!_ ’

Dex clapped a hand over Nursey’s mouth.

‘I love you, but do not finish that sentence.’

Nursey licked his palm, so Dex took it away with a warning glare. He wiped it off on Nursey’s knee. His boyfriend grinned, unrepentant, and snuggled up closer.

‘I was grumpy because I slipped on my way to office hours and had to wear my coffee. So then I had to go change into my backup shirt in Faber—how long have you had that card hidden in my cubby?’

‘Uhhhh… I may have bribed Tango to go put it in there yesterday. So you had a rough day and then were avoiding home because you were grumpy?’

‘Yeah, and it felt like the sort of grumpiness that needed some indulging and that other people being just ridiculously happy—not undeservedly or whatever, just, like, happier than I was given my day—that would have made it worse.’

‘Plus, you knew I’d come find you.’

‘You didn’t even have to get me out of a tree this time.’

‘I’ve only had to do that once. Please don’t repeat that one. It was bad all around.’

They had, by this point, both abandoned their work. Nursey moved his books aside and crowded fully into Dex’s space, at which point he found himself approximately eye level with the cupcake carrier. He snaked an arm out and pulled it closer.

‘What’d you bring me, babe?’

‘Birthday cupcakes. Chocolate with rhubarb goo in the center. Since Bitty’s not here to enforce any sort of command performance for your birthday before dispersing to dates and such, I figured a cake would be kinda impractical. So you can have as many of these as you like.’

‘But you’d also, I suspect, like to eat at least one of them yourself.’

‘I would not say no, but these are also a part of your present.’

‘You get one to start with, then. Because I say so.’ Nursey turned his head up toward Dex’s face and offered him a look that was equal parts exuberance and I-dare-you-to-challenge-me-on-this.

‘Well, if you insiiiiist.’

Dex handed Nursey a cupcake and then got one for himself.

‘But we gotta reseal the container in case any librarians are patrolling.’ As he spoke, he fit the lid back to the carrier.

‘Sounds like you’ve been listening to too much Night Vale again.’

‘I didn’t mean it like _that_.’

‘And yet.’

They ate their cupcakes in silence. Relative silence, anyway, broken mostly by Nursey’s noises of appreciation. Once he’d finished his, Dex curled his arms around Nursey.

‘How much more work do you have to do before you feel alright heading out?’

‘Half an hour, maybe, if I’m diligent and productive?’

‘Setting an alarm for forty minutes, then. Check.’ Dex started a timer on his phone.

‘What, you don’t believe that I can be diligent and productive?’

‘While you have literally not moved from where you’re cuddled up to me, out of reach of both your books and your laptop?’ Dex smirked down at Nursey in his best ‘well-there’ face.

‘You’ve trapped me here in the circle of your arms.’ Nursey almost kept a straight face as he said it, but dissolved into giggling right at the end.

‘Circle of my arms, Nurse? You’ve been reading too many Romantics again.’

‘Any big-R Romantics are too many, Dexy. And I have not been reading any little-r ones lately.’

Dex made a show of moving his arms, but Nursey grabbed them and hugged them closer than before.

‘Tell you want. We’ll scootch over to the corner so I can lean against the pillar and you can lean back on me. Then we can both try to work, and we’ll head home when you’re ready?’

‘Sounds good.’ Nursey paused until Dex had scooted out of reach. ‘That way it’ll be prose before bros.’

‘I hate you. That’s a lie.’

‘I know. But it always counts as a win for the conversation.’

‘You keep score?’

‘You don’t?’

‘…No. Now c’mere. My side won’t lean on itself.’

Nursey fit himself against Dex’s side with his pile of books in easy reach. Dex slung an arm across Nursey’s chest, occasionally smoothing his hand up and down across it. He got back to work on his bibliography.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to the marvelous Denois for the beta-read.


End file.
